Sunshine
by OveliaGirlHaditRight
Summary: What my piece for the Sora Zine on Tumblr would have been, if I'd gotten in: when you know the answer to why you are the way you are-and while that state of your being itself never really changes, perhaps the reason for it does. Why does Sora always smile? This is my way of trying to answer that: based on my favorite KHII Sora fic (that's now gone) that tried to answer this, too.


**Sunshine**

Sora sat at a campfire, by himself now, as he again thought over how Donald and Goofy had just asked him why he was always smiling. He'd at first thought they were joking, and wanted him to retort it was because the gummi ship ran on happy faces. Right?

But the moment he could tell they were serious, he had of course answered that it was because of his friends who were always with him in more ways than one, and who had saved him so many times.

Though that had done nothing to alleviate Donald and Goofy's fears, either. Sora hadn't known why they were concerned, and still didn't. Was it because his happy-go-lucky attitude during the Exam had made him an easy target for Xehanort… or did they were worry his denying his inner darkness—and blocking it out with light—would lead to him falling? Sora wasn't sure. But even though he had been confused by Donald and Goofy's worry and still was, he was also touched by their love for them and had made sure to tell them that.

And he had promised them that if they were that afraid of what might happen, he'd make sure to try and somewhat do better on this quest—as long as they were always with him, and they promised him they would be.

So, while going out to the new worlds, Sora tried to be light and humorous as he usually was when the situation called for it—and this time, the situation really _did_ call for it most of the time. And Sora felt like he, Donald, and Goofy were getting into more funny hijinks with people than they usually did—but also to make sure he was sober, if need be.

But oh, when he got to the Keyblade Graveyard—and he needed to be upset there more than ever, with all that he lost—Sora ended up wishing strongly that he'd never thought about any of this, about giving himself a reality check… that he would have just opted to stay optimistic, and that Kingdom Hearts maybe would have rewarded him if he had.

And when he was crying to Riku, that he was worthless without his friends and now they were all gone… what other choice did fate have, then, then to swallow both him and Riku up, too, to make Sora pay for those words?

…And then Sora found his Light in the Darkness. His Kairi: something that he'd been suspecting about her and their bond for a while now…

And though most of this was lost in the depths of his memories, Sora had thought he'd heard that term used about Kairi in regard to him before. And he'd idly wondered then if that meant what he was taking from it: that he, perhaps, would have been a much different person—a darker one—if Kairi hadn't come into his life like a comet for the soul.

But it was only after Sora had twirled her around—feeling better than he had in a long time, when he realized that she had saved him as she had promised, and that through that it had allowed him to aid everyone else, too—and Kairi was explaining things to him, that Sora thought he really understood it all.

No… he wouldn't have necessarily been a different person without Kairi, but her natural light—that of a Princess of Heart—made his shine all the brighter, as she worked with him to get things done (though Kairi, ever modest, wouldn't take credit for any of that at all).

And Sora hoped that he could somehow make _her_ shine all the brighter, too—and that he could do the same for his other friends—so they could show the world what it could be by example, not leave it as it was. And it was why Sora suddenly decided that Donald and Goofy thinking he smiled too much—even if he of _course_ got where they had been coming from—was _wrong_: because if the other way was just seeing the crack in the surface, instead of finding a way to patch it up through sheer force of will… Sora knew which one he'd choose every single time.

When Kairi brought Sora back to the others, he was truly out of breath from everything he'd just experienced—and also in being in awe at Kairi, who all of his feelings for were finally coming together like a massive puzzle—but as Sora felt that he'd just figured out a mystery of the universe through it all, and that the prophecy really meant nothing and they _had_ to win… what else would he feel soon after, than the rug being pulled out from under him once again?

The person who had just given Sora all these wonderful feelings—and made square pieces fit into circles holes for him, like they never had before—… Kairi, was struck down right in front of Sora's eyes. And there was _no_ world without her.

For a moment, Sora fell himself being pulled into the pit of darkness, that he'd always fought _so_ hard against, as he tried to _murder_ Xehanort for his actions and almost seemed to wish that it had been anyone _but_ Kairi who had died.

Eventually—like how the night was always darkest before the dawn—Sora found some hope again… in the form of Roxas chastising him, of _all_ people, for being worried… in Xion comforting him about Kairi's condition… with Donald and Goofy being there for him as they _always_ were—as Sora so needed—now being _his_ points of reason… and in the promise that there was a way to stop Master Xehanort, after all.

And Sora held onto this promise and did the right thing for the world, as he had since he'd realized on his first adventure that his new friends from the other worlds were just as much his responsibility as anyone and anything else.

And so, Sora found bits of the light again this way… even though at this point, it was like slats of it coming in through barely opened blinds—the darkness still ever-present there—but he would gladly take it to any alternative.

And Sora found himself thinking about Kairi—as he fought and fought and fought the Xehanort clones in Scala Ad Caelum, in some ways thinking he was losing his chance to see Kairi ever again forever by doing so, but also thinking that this might be the only way to save her…

Perhaps he'd put her up on a pedestal. Even if she couldn't have darkness in her heart, it was clear that she still had anxieties, insecurities, and self-consciousness that she worked through to be the most bright star that she was. In a lot of ways, she had worked to push the light through her own blinds, too, and wasn't too different from Sora right now, in that way.

And that… that was really the way one ought to live their life—and it was now clearer to Sora than anything else was; he knew Donald and Goofy even did this themselves, too ("_No frowning, no sad faces." "Yeah, you've gotta look funny. Like us."_), even if they hadn't quite seen it on that night a few months back—so when the choice soon became Sora's own life or Kairi's, Sora chose the latter _gladly_; and made sure to embrace Kairi with any light he could, even to his last moments, so she might never know the clouds as the backdrop to the silver lining while he was there.

But Sora wasn't foolish enough to think it would all be rainbows and sunshine for Kairi without him, either. No.

But Sora liked to believe that maybe he'd passed on some of his light to her-so she had that to stand on, and to fight the darkness with, when she surely started her own journey, that would surely be _so_ much like his.

For the ones you loved deserved nothing less than all the sunshine you could give them, in Sora's eyes.


End file.
